Pinching Pennies - Homemade Jam

It's Thrifty Thursday and another way to pinch those pennies is by making your own jam/jelly.  I make jam year round even though we live in a state where winter lasts from November to March.  I freeze berries during berry season and when I run out then I either buy frozen berries or purchase berries that are on the reduced  produce rack for $0.99/lb.  I pick them over, compost any icky ones and then crush the rest for jam.  When I freeze berries, once they are thawed, I save the extra berry juice to make jelly ( the difference between jam and jelly is that jam has fruit chunks in it and jelly does not). 

I use this extremely easy recipe and Ball glass mason jars,  Ball plastic freezer jars with screw on lids, or just plain old Rubbermaid containers to put my jam in.  This past week I purchased 2lbs of fresh strawberries on clearance and 12 oz of raspberries.  I crushed each separately and added some leftover blueberry juice that I had in the freezer to each batch of berries.  I ended up making three large jars of jam for $2.50.

Enjoy the taste of summer all year long and bask in the smiles on your family's faces when they spread homemade jam on a big ol' slice of bread.

Until next time,

Dawna

Pinching Pennies - Homemade Stock

   by  Juan-Calderon 

Happy Thursday my thrifty friends.  To further our dollars at the grocery store, I make my own stock rather than buying it (I do purchase it in a pinch but prefer to make my own).  Remember the turkey I cooked up last week... well, I saved all the broth and the carcass to make a lovely stock for turkey soup that we will be having this week.

Stock is amazingly easy to make.  I keep a container in my freezer and pop in all of my scrap veggie ends, onion peels, garlic, etc. and when the container is full I make up some stock.  What I love about the stock making process is that it is incredibly flexible and is practically foolproof (unless you use too many parsnips in which case your broth may have a bit of a kick to it). You can store stock in the refrigerator for up to a week or you can freeze it for 3 - 6 months.  Freeze in mason jars, Ziplock freezer bags, ice cube trays, or greased muffin tins and then pop out the broth and put into a freezer bag once it is frozen.  Check out these great links for step by step instructions:

   by  LollyKnit 

Vegetable Stock
Version 1
Version 2

Chicken Stock
Ina Garten's version
*Note: I always keep the meat rather than discarding it....  Just remove the chicken after 1 hour of cooking and let it cool enough before you take the meat off.  Add bones, carcass and any parts you do not want to eat back to your stock mixture.
Version 2  using chicken carcass.
* Note - I usually keep carcasses in my freezer until I have a three or four and then I make my broth.
Version 3  uses the crock pot.

Beef Stock
Version 1


Enjoy the tasty satisfaction of making your own rich stock at home!

Happy Cooking!!!
 - Dawna -